American Cinematographer - April 2004 - 96

The Case for Film Dailies
says, "and we had no sense of where
the lab standard was. If you're

going to do a digital intermediate,
you need to know where your
printer lights are, and how the
physical image looks related to
that. Some days they were great,
but on other days, you'd wonder
who turned up the magenta, or
why the grass looked a fluorescent
shade of green. I told [producers]
Kathy Kennedy and Frank
Marshall, 'This is no way to judge
our work. You can get beautiful

Schwartzman screened

at a

local

cinema.

Laszlo Kovacs, ASC had his

first

experience with digital dailies in

MGM film with

a

$20 million budg¬

mainly at practical locations in
Chicago (AC May '00). The director
was Bonnie Hunt, an actress taking
her first turn at the helm. During the
first week to 10 days, the negative
was processed at Astro Labs in
Chicago, which provided film dailies
by 7:30 the next morning. "That's
et,

the

role of

every day of produc¬
Two Weeks Notice, a 40' trail¬

During
tion

on

containing a screening room trav¬
eled with the company, making it
convenient for the filmmakers to
er

view dailies

projected

big

on a

Kovacs

points out that in a
comedy, physical timing and the
screen.

undercurrent of emotion

can

be

a

house then transferred the film to

stresses

hi-def video. I did

how those

book. We used

an

everything by the
18-percent

gray¬

scale card,

correctly lit and exposed.
projector and a large
screen. The first day of HD dailies
was
horrendous; they looked
We had

a

video

that it

essential to

was

see

shadings played when
they were projected with film on a
big screen. "The cast and crew were
also energized by the experience of
viewing film dailies together," he
adds. "Sometimes I'd

see an

electri¬

being a
guardian of the

cian in the

Even the gray

with

art form. That's

wasn't

value of film dailies. Wood feels that

more

digital dailies "hurt younger cine¬
matographers working on inde¬
pendent features the most.
Sometimes they don't see their work
on film until we
get to work prints,
and they're forced to make aesthetic
compromises."
When Kramer Morgenthau

dailies."

There were

card looked a bit light.

no

colors and

no

blacks."

going to watch dailies any¬
because they were not repre¬

sentative of the filmmakers' work,

and

they would give her the

idea. "I

was

wrong
also worried about the

continuity of scene-to-scene match¬
ing," he says. "I set up a system with

Kramer

Morgenthau

most

important shots each day. They

put them on a Hazeltine
what I needed

to

and told me
print¬

know about

ing lights."
When he shot Two Weeks

a

trailer, and he'd leave
smile on his face, more deter¬

mined than

It's

Kovacs told Hunt that he

Deluxe where I selected the two
-

went to
a

ever

to

do his best."

impossible to calculate the

Montreal

to

shoot Godsend,

relatively low-budget feature, he
convincing the pro¬

succeeded in

ducers and Lions Gate executives

images with HD dailies, but it
doesn't always represent what you

Notice in New York with another

that film dailies

the film.'" Schwartzman

first-time director, Marc Lawrence,

explains, "As a cinematographer, you
have to assume the role of being a
guardian of the art form. That's why
I'm willing to fight for film dailies.
You're making a movie for a canvas
that's 40 feet wide or larger, and the
reality is that with digital images you

have

on

began getting MOS film dailies
during the third week. He screened
them at the lab each morning while
he was shooting in Los Angeles.
When Seabiscuit was filming on
location, the cinematographer
began each day with a phone call to
Technicolor's John Bickford, who
gave
sent

April 2004

screen.

washed-out and lacked textures.

why I'm willing
to fight for film

92

the

"Afterwards, we shipped
negative to Deluxe in Los
Angeles, and a postproduction
the

assume

on

totally different type of challenge. In
many comedic scenes, audiences are
expected to read between the lines,
since characters don't always mean
exactly what they say. Kovacs

established the look,"

we

Kovacs says.

cinematographer,
you have to

action

2000 when he shot Return to Me, an

when

"Asa

employer (played by Hugh Grant)
falling in love, long before their
feelings were revealed by dialogue or

were

him a verbal report. The lab
weekly "selects," which

Kovacs

appealed to producer Sandra
Bullock, who also starred in the film,
and asked for film dailies. She sup¬

ported him, and he got film dailies.
Kovacs explains that he felt it was
important for Lawrence to see
nuances like the backlight
playing on
Bullock's hair and the glint in her
eyes. These subtleties provided visu¬
al clues that the character and her

can't
in

were

see nuances on

necessary

actors' faces

He

or

colors, how a costume works with

the

production design, or how grain
and contrast will play on

structure
American Cinematographer - April 2004

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of American Cinematographer - April 2004
